How Did They Do That? The Keys to Our Success – Lessons Learned from 25 of Our Best Project Managers

What are the keys to success in Leadership, Program Management, General Management and Project Management?

We sought out 25 of our leaders in these areas to find out. We approached those widely regarded as industry leaders and asked them a straight forward question: What is the best piece of advice you would share for your success? The result is this book—a collection of their best stories, lessons, and takeaways. 25 different industry leaders make 25 different compelling cases for why their key will help influence your project success:

• The seven bullets of highly effective project managers.

• Why leadership must be taken, not given.

• The importance of becoming project business-savvy.

• Ways to generate meaningful client ownership.

• How great project managers make it fun.

• And 20 other differentiators that have helped these industry leaders stand out.

This book and this presentation presents ideas, tools and techniques for all types of managers who aspire to be great at what they do.

Based on my book

We brought Mr. David Barrett from Toronto to our chapter. Some of my chapter leaders had heard a brief presentation made by Mr. Barrett at the 2013 region 3 PMI summit, and we felt he would be an entertaining and positive experience for our chapter. We were totally underestimating that!

Mr. Barrett presented two different topics to our chapter members – one on making and keeping connections and one discussing chapters of his excellent book on project management best practices. We had a break in between the two sessions, and the comments we heard during that break were amazing.

“That was a great presentation; I can’t wait for the next one.”

“When will the break finish? I want us to get started again.”

“I wish my friend could be here. Are you going to bring this guy back?”

These were just some of the comments we heard. Just as meaningful was the fact that even though the night went longer than expected, no one left before the end of Mr. Barrett’s second presentation. (And we had a room of over 150 attendees!)

Needless to say, my board and I left that evening with our heads high, as we knew we’d accomplished our mission – providing value to our members. And thanks to Mr. Barrett, we made that happen in a way that far exceeded our and their expectation. We are appreciative for his time and talent, and definitely look forward to welcoming him back to RI in the near future.